Synthetic Philosophy and Deductive Engineering
Evolutionary thinking is pervasive in the rationale for SPaDE. This document is intended to provide an overview of how it contributes to the project and to expose the relationship between the distinct threads of evolutionary thinking in SPaDE.
Though evolution may be thought of as an empirical theory, at the level it is treated in SPaDE it is more philosophical, and is interlinked with philosophical considerations in epistemology, language, logic and ethics.
The aim of SPaDE is to contribute to the proliferation of benign intelligence across the cosmos. Intelligence in homo sapiens is not merely a feature of the individuals of the species. Its most outstanding achievements are often lauded as the product of individual genius, but it is more rational to conceive them as arising from a culture which values individual contributions and gives credit to individuals for achievements they could not have even contemplated without the context which prior culture provided and the support which social institutions and collaborators provided.
The cultural nature of intelligence is yet more conspicuous in determining its moral character, but the possibility of ethical norms is contingent upon their consistency with evolutionary imperatives. An unconditional moral preference for chastity could not flourish for long.
Putting aside the question of what norms are conducive to or constitute benign intelligence, it is clear that they must be consistent with and be domiciled in a culture which is competitive in self-proliferation.
For this reason SPaDE, in pursuit of its aims, has two sides, one instrumental, the other normative. The instrumental aspects embed the normative elements in a context (culture) which will proliferate across the cosmos most effectively. The normative side is concerned primarily with the problem of promoting healthy continual evolution of benign values (this is of course, much harder than getting a leg up on instrumental matters).
The present emphasis in the more detailed strategy which the following evolutionary threads are intended to illuminate, is on the instrumental proposals. The technical proposals which the threads expose concern the representation of declarative knowledge and its exploitation using deductive methods.
Each thread has a separate document with cross references where appropriate. The documents anticipated are:
For the purposes of this project, the narratives connected with those threads are important.
They are:
1 The starting point at which SPaDE begins, in relation spacifically to the nature and potential role of deductive methods in the evolution of intelligence.
2 A first projection as to role of deductive methods as the proliferation of intelligence across the galaxy is under way.
3 A speculation about how that projection might fit into a larger context in which the instrumental benefits of deductive methods support the proliferation of benign intelligence across and beyond the galaxy.
These will be linked from here as soon as they are under way